"The Spatial Information Design Lab is a think- and action-tank at Columbia University specializing in the visual display of spatial information about contemporary cities and events. The lab works with data about space -- numeric data combined with narratives and images to design compelling visual presentations about our world today. The projects in the lab focus on linking social data with geography to help researchers and advocates communicate information clearly, responsibly, and provocatively. We work with survey and census data, Global Positioning System information, maps, high- and low-resolution satellite imagery, analytic graphics, photographs and drawings, along with narratives and qualitative interpretations, to produce images." [via: http://speedbird.wordpress.com/2010/12/27/the-rockefeller-foundation-on-the-future-of-crowdsourced-cities/ ]

"These are some easily-foreseeable problems w/ purely bottom-up approaches to urban informatics. None of this is to denigrate legacy of Jane Jacobs…remains personal hero & primary touchstone for my work. & none of it is to argue that there oughn’t be central role for democratic voice in development of policy, management of place & delivery of services. It’s just to signal that things might not be as clearcut as we might wish—especially those of us who have historically been energized by presence of clear (& clearly demonizable) opponent.

If I’ve spent my space here calling attention to pitfalls of bottom-up approaches…because I think the promise is so self-evident…delighted to hear Anthony Townsend’s prognostication of/call for a “planet of civic laboratories,” in which getting to scale immediately is less important than a robust search of possibility space around these new technologies, & how citydwellers around world will use them in their making of place."